Many women and children find themselves struggling to find food. This is a problem across Philadelphia and in the Germantown area. For Face to Face volunteers Molly Mahon and Maureen Fanning, this is why they got involved.

“I hate seeing women and children that are food insecure,” said Fanning. “Thinking about how they got there just makes me sad and I want to do something to help them.”

This is exactly what Fanning did. In 2012, Fanning and Mahon joined Pheed Philadelphia in order to make a difference.

“After joining Pheed Philadelphia we started volunteering at soup kitchens around the area and Face to Face is one of the main locations we go to,” said Mahon.

Face to Face is a non-profit organization that focuses on human services and they are dedicated to the “health, well-being, and stability of our community,” Face to Face

The health and well-being of the Germantown area is a common concern. This is why La Salle’s Exploring Nutrition project set up the Germantown Hunger Network. – Newsworks

This network is a combination of all of the organizations and non-profits in the area all working separately towards the same goal.

“All these programs that we are putting a ton of money into, a ton of energy, a ton of smart people, smart ideas, aren’t working in the same neighborhood so how is that going to have any sort of impact on feeding Philadelphians,” said Tom Wingert, founder of the Germantown Hunger Network.

In addition to the many organizations in the area, La Salle will add to it the groups involved in the Exploring Nutrition project including nutrition students, fraternities, and those in the Leadership and Global Understanding program.

The LGU program takes the lead on organizing a food drive each year to bring food to the surrounding food banks. The Fresh Grocer provides the food given out.

“It took a lot of planning to take the lead in organizing such a big food drive,” said LGU student Catherine Buck. “But I feel like we have such a big impact on so many lives that it makes it worth it.”

The impact Buck hopes to make is being able to change the eating habits of local Philadelphians even in the slightest.

“People around here just don’t have the ability to get the healthy food that they need because it’s expensive to get vegetables and fruit,” said Buck. “And keeping it fresh is a whole other story.”

This is one of the biggest problems that causes hunger and not only in the Germantown area. There are three causes of unhealthy eating including not having the knowledge of what to eat, how to eat, and how to cook, not having the money to pay for food that is healthy, and above all is not having the time to take the effort to cook a healthy meal.

“Three top reasons; No money, don’t feel like you have skills, don’t feel like you have time,” said Director of La Salle Nutrition Jule Anne Henstenburg.

Many people try to educate about how to eat healthy including nutritionists stationed at grocery stores such as Henstenburg and even First Lady Michelle Obama hopes to improve education about what is healthy with the new labels.

“The updates announced today support the First Lady’s Let’s Move! Initiative in its ongoing efforts to provide parents and families with access to information that helps them make healthier choices,” said a White House representative.

Once people have the knowledge about what to eat and how to eat right, this cannot be done if they don’t have the money to buy the foods they need. One solution to this problem is the food stamps provided by the national government.

“I used to be able to last through a month on my food stamps and buy what I needed to buy,” said Philadelphia resident David Harris. “Now I can’t”

In 2013, food stamps were cut back and SNAP benefits will be about $1.40 less per person per meal in 2014. –CBPP

This is where the food pantries and food drives organized by LGU students come in. With less funding from the government, people rely more on food pantries.

Kimberly Johns lives in the Logan section of Philadelphia with her three children and since buying fruits and vegetables is too expensive after a $36/month cut back in SNAP benefits she needs to rely on pantries to get the healthy foods she needs. –Newsworks

With the food from Fresh Grocer, LGU students and other members of the Exploring Nutrition project set out to bring fresh carrots, potatoes, and much more to the dozen sites in the Germantown area.

Members of Face to Face such as Mahon and Fanning spend six days a week at soup kitchens volunteering and trying to make a difference, but this annual LGU and Exploring Nutrition food drive is a special time for the people of Germantown.

“It’s nice to get some extra food every spring for the people around here,” said Fanning. “I’m so glad Exploring Nutrition does this because it means a lot to see how happy the people who receive the food are.”

Although there are a lot of problems still in regard to providing healthy food options for the people of Philadelphia, the Exploring Nutrition project and food drive is able to make a difference.

These charts show Food Security in the United States. Children unfortunately tend to be food insecure.

, look to assist with the problem using their knowledge.

The major difference between the two problems citizens face is that food insecurity is less about the physical bodily reaction to the lack of food.

According to Henstenburg, food insecurity is “not having economic or physical access to food” while hunger is “a physiologic issue, hunger is the feeling of painful sensations that come from a lack of eating.”

The biggest populations dealing with hunger are the elderly, children, and women.

Many women and children are hungry because of how many single-family homes there are with a woman as the head of the family Henstenburg explained.

The dietitians and nutritionists hope to make a difference in areas in need by providing assistance at grocery stores around the city.

The areas in need of special assistance are the places described as food deserts. These food deserts are places without a grocery store with fresh food.

“Food deserts are typically considered a place where sort of fresh healthy food is not readily available,” said Henstenburg. “It’s typically considered a place where people will go to small markets or convenient stores to buy the food that they need.”

In addition to these food deserts, people struggle to eat healthy because of a lack of money, time, and cooking skills.

Henstenburg said that she hopes to improve healthy eating habits by providing pamphlets and educating people in these three areas. Another way to help out is by volunteering at food drives and other helpful programs such as The Share Food Program.

]]>https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/dietitians-aim-to-improve-health-in-food-deserts/feed/0bethany11loweThese charts show Food Security in the United States. Children unfortunately tend to be food insecure.La Salle Breaks Ground on Community Gardenhttps://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/la-salle-breaks-ground-on-community-garden/
https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/la-salle-breaks-ground-on-community-garden/#respondFri, 25 Apr 2014 00:43:24 +0000http://bflowe.wordpress.com/?p=99La Salle ECO club broke ground on April 11 on their community garden located in the Germantown area. Check out this slideshow to see some of the faces behind the cause!
]]>https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/la-salle-breaks-ground-on-community-garden/feed/0bethany11loweApps Help Control the Cravingshttps://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/10/goldbacher/
https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/04/10/goldbacher/#respondThu, 10 Apr 2014 19:02:30 +0000http://bflowe.wordpress.com/?p=91

Have you ever had a long day and looked in the freezer for ice cream to eat your troubles away? Dr. Edie Goldbacher, Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at La Salle University, knows a lot about this. Obesity, emotional eating, and weight management are some of Dr. Golbacher’s areas of expertise.

Dr. Goldbacher studied at The College of New Jersey for her Bachelor’s in Psychology and got her Ph.D in Clinical and Health Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh. She completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Temple University’s Center for Obesity Research and Education.

With this background, Dr. Goldbacher focuses on weight and eating related concerns including the problems of obesity in America and how to take care of the issue.

“You can see there’s a pretty significant portion of the United States where the percentage of individuals with obesity is greater than or equal to 30%” said Dr. Goldbacher. “So over the past 2 and a half decades the prevalence rates have increased.”

With obesity becoming more of a concern each year, Dr. Goldbacher looks at what are some of the causes of being overweight.

“Genetics load the gun, the environment pulls the trigger,” said Dr. Goldbacher.

Some people have trouble maintaining a healthy weight because of their genetics, but most of the reason why people become obese is because of the choices they make about eating. Dr. Goldbacher suggests monitoring eating habits and physical activity, which recent Apps have helped with.

“The electronic resources for self monitoring and for monitoring the changes people are making have really grown significantly,” said Dr. Goldbacher.
These healthy Apps are offered for both iPhone and Android users. Obesity is a problem in America and using these Apps could help improve the numbers by making you think twice about eating that ice cream after a long day.

Check out the link above to see how some of the meals I like to get at McDonald’s compare to each other! Weird to think that I’d be eating less calories if I ate Chicken McNuggets rather than Oatmeal! But also something to think about is that even though I am eating less calories doesn’t mean I am eating HEALTHIER. Eating based on low calories isn’t always best I guess!

With March, National Nutrition Month, approaching, Michelle Obama and other advocates for nutrition took steps towards making the packaging and nutrition labels in order to promote healthier eating.

At the end of February, the Food and Drug Administration and Michelle Obama proposed changes to the nutrition facts found on food. The new guidelines suggest larger displays of calorie count, added sugars and serving size. Change to a system that has been the same for 20 years.

“Obama administration officials say the update, unveiled Thursday [February 27] at a White House event, is necessary to keep pace with the science of nutrition and to reduce confusion about what qualifies as healthful food.” Washington Post

The idea of labels on food becoming more understandable could be very beneficial for America because currently some of the labels are confusing to even very educated people.

“Unless you had a thesaurus, a microscope, a calculator or a degree in nutrition, you were out of luck,” Michelle Obama said. “So you felt defeated, and you just went back to buying the same stuff. As parents and as consumers, we have a right to understand what’s in the food we’re feeding our families.” Michelle Obama’s Speech

Changing the food labels to be more understandable will be beneficial to all Americans, but the question is how well will they succeed in making the nutrition facts and ingredients that much easier to understand?

As the months go on trying to come to a conclusion about changing the labels, I look forward to seeing how much the FDA and Michelle Obama are able to simplify the labels.

]]>https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/03/13/marching-into-nutrition/feed/0bethany11loweSprite LabelPot Brownies unaffected by Decrease in SNAP fundinghttps://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/02/14/snap/
https://bflowe.wordpress.com/2014/02/14/snap/#respondFri, 14 Feb 2014 22:19:45 +0000http://bflowe.wordpress.com/?p=48The government decreased funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in order to cut back on spending. This has been a problem since 2009 when the stimulus bill was passed.

With these cutbacks to the SNAP funding, the people in support are expecting the food banks to fill in for what SNAP can’t help any longer according to the article in the Morning Call.

Because people are receiving less money, they’ve started running out of money earlier in the month and they’ve been heading to the food banks earlier and earlier. By the end of the month, the food banks are running out of food.

As someone who tries to be optimistic, the only positive I can see in this situation is that it wasn’t as bad as it was expected to be. According to an article on Takepart.com called “Antihunger Groups Reject SNAP cuts in the new Farm Bill”, the cuts could have been worse.

“Though the cuts are far less deep than threatened—$8 billion over 10 years instead of the $39 billion the initial House version had hoped to “save”—the changes will mean even leaner times for America’s poor,” -takepart.com

But not only are they cutting back the amount of food provided for those in need, because Pennsylvania has the Heat and Eat program, it’s awful to think that people in the area are with minimal heat with all of the bad weather we have been having!

Another article on Takepart.com explains that Colorado is struggling with the legalization of marijuana in regard to food stamps and SNAP because people have been buying weed brownies with their government issued money.

Overall, I hope the government is able to put a handle on the pot brownie situation because if some people are buying weed with their SNAP money and some Philadelphians are barely getting by that is not alright.

The food banks are in need of some help because of the pressure that has been put on them with the cuts made by the government.